BEVERLY HILLS, April 29, (THEWILL) – These are cheering times for La Liga Catalan club Barcelona and their returning President, Joan Laporta. Two breaking stories on Thursday will ease Laporta into the challenges of navigating the post-pandemic era and afford him the levity to adjust at a steady pace while steering the club gradually back to profitability.
Of the two stories, the most remarkable is the possibility that Barca will be able to have their linchpin, the mercurial Argentine and team captain Lionel Messi in the club after the record-breaking product of the Barca Academy took tentative “first steps” towards remaining at Camp Nou for another next season.
This comes as a result of comments attributed to Messi’s father, Jorge Messi, who acts as a confidante and representative of the iconic footballer, told Laporta that Messi has made up his mind to stay. THEWILL recalls that Jorge was deeply involved in the exit crisis of last summer when Messi attempted to force an exit and handed in a transfer request by fax.
But for the insistence of former club president Jose Maria Bartomeu, Messi could have left Barca, with Manchester City, to reunite with former manager Pep Guardiola, and Paris Saint-Germain, to play side-by-side again with Brazilian pal, Neymar, as possible destinations. But, forced to stay at the club against his will, Messi accepted his fate and set his mind once again to deliver for the club.
One reason for his positive take on the enforced stay from last summer was the inglorious resignation of Bartomeu and his administration which led to the remergence of Laporta. The new president and Messi enjoy a fairly mutual relationship founded on their love for the club especially from Laporta’s first tenure as President. Messi sees him as a good leader with the drive to positively impact on the club while Laporta views the captain as a central part of the team.
They tend to agree with Messi’s projection of the changes that need to occur for progress to take place for which a drastic change to the club’s disastrous recruitment strategy is of extreme importance, as well as a focus on youth development to restore the identity that brought the club to prominence under Pep Guardiola and from which Messi himself benefitted.
To cement their working together, Jorge Messi met with Laporta and their fruitful discussions left the older Messi happy about the future of the club and of his son’s part in that outlook. This has led to increased speculations that Messi will not be leaving at the expiration of his contract.
The likelihood that a new offer will be made to the player is higher now but it will be a substantially reduced deal than the one he is currently signed for, details of which leaked to the media in January, as reported by THEWILL. Those leaks put his current salary at about €138m per season, which, though on the high side, is not outside the realm of what the player makes for the club and more.
Given Barca’s current financial burden, a workable agreement for cutting some of Messi’s salary will be in line with the president’s attempts to streamline the club’s expenses to make them profitable. For Messi, wages have not been his overarching concern but the sustainability of the club going forward and their ability to compete at the top of football in Europe.
As a new deal may be underway for Messi to remain, Barca’s second joyous news is that a financial reprieve of over €200m has been granted the club as it struggles to contend with an overwhelming weight of debt worsened by the pandemic.
One of the issues Messi was fighting against has been responsible for the sorry state of Barca’s finances before the pandemic made it worse. A careless and frivolous expenditure in the transfer market coupled with an out-of-control wage bill already put the club’s finances in the red. With losses of almost €100m from the previous season, their gross debt recently surpassed the €1bn mark.
As THEWILL reported in January, La Blaugrana had pleaded for leniency with their investors as they made internal efforts to tighten expenditure and agreed on wage cuts with their payroll, all in an attempt to avoid defaulting on their debts and potentially going bankrupt. They asked Goldman Sachs, Allianz and Prudential for flexibility after they were unable to meet a payment of €200m.
The report on Thursday is that an unnamed group of European investors have agreed to “remove limits on indebtedness and financial expenses” for the Catalan club to the tune of €200m, congruent with the amount for which they pleaded clemency.
The twin benefits of no longer having the pressure of those limits dangling on their necks for the time being and the enablement the freedom offers to focus on meeting other payment deadlines will be an immense respite for Barca.
It is factual that they are a long way from being out of the woods, but having substantial evidence of keeping Messi, making positive changes to the club structure, streamlining expenses to return to profitability, getting a hefty reprieve from financial commitments and having Laporta’s goodwill bringing the old Barcelona back all point to a gradual movement forward on the right path.
About the Author
Jude Obafemi is a versatile senior Correspondent at THEWILL Newspapers, excelling in sourcing, researching, and delivering sports news stories for both print and digital publications.
